low, rasping voice. An unnatural voice, not the caller’s own. Not a text to my mobile phone, a call to my landline – a link, a specific location. Whoever’s making contact knows where I live. It’s intimate and menacing. I want to ask who it is, but the words won’t escape my mouth. The line goes dead.
I rush to the window and look outside. A black and white cat is scratching at the door of the house opposite, desperate to escape the damp chill of an October night. Headlights swing from the main road and onto our street, briefly spotlighting the cat, which ceases its scratching as if ashamed to be caught in so undignified an act. The lights power past and it’s left yowling for its absent owners. Nothing else moves. I look at my mobile then the landline, waiting for it to ring again. It doesn’t.
I reread the text from earlier. It’s still there, it’s real, I’m not losing my mind. I need a plan. It can only be a matter of time before this person states their intention or someone joins the dots.
Ghosts do not exist. It was Julia’s imagination that heard the tread of heavy workmen’s boots behind her as she walked down the dimly lit streets of North London. Paranoia caused her to spin around to find a deserted pavement. Since escaping Guildford, she sensed a pressure on the edge of her bed that woke her in the night and made her turn on the light, expecting to see Genevieve sitting there, tearful and confessional.
‘I knew Dominic would come back,’ she had said. ‘I hadn’t understood the form.’
Maybe Genevieve was right, maybe they all came back in one form or another.
But recently the footsteps behind her hadn’t been heavy. And when she spun around the street wasn’t empty. A man would pull his head under the hood of a winter jacket and duck into a doorway.
There had been no contact between her, Gideon and Alan, a blessing mostly. But a tiny part of her wanted to speak to them. Did they hear the dull thump of Brandon’s boots behind them when they crossed a street? Did they catch the scent of beer and sweat as they opened their eyes in the morning? She wanted to ask them, does knowing you’re going insane mean that, actually, you’re not?
Julia had finished work late that night. The pub, just off Goodge Street, had been busier than usual and it had taken forever to empty the drip trays, wash down the bar and hoover the floor. By the time she emerged from Archway Tube station, with sore feet and an aching back, it was gone twelve. The entrance hall funnelled the wind. Discarded crisp packets and flyers spiralled above her, in mockery of autumn leaves. Julia pulled her collar up against the cold and bent her head to the wind as she crossed Junction Road and descended the hill.
When Pearl had moved in with Rudi, she suggested Julia took over her room in the shared house on Fairbridge Road. Julia had accepted. The last of Pearl’s housemates had moved out the following month. The new ones were strangers. Julia liked it that way – they left her alone.
Pearl often phoned and even came to the house. If she hadn’t been busy decorating her new place in Maida Vale, she would have been more persistent in her calls, which Julia failed to return. Like Audrey, Pearl saw too much.
Andre had moved back home to live with his parents while he studied for a Master’s in business administration. He could rarely afford trips to London.
Working two jobs kept Julia busy, stilled her mind and gave her an excuse to avoid all of them. The new exciting careers she’d dreamt of when living in Guildford had turned into working as a receptionist by day and a barmaid by night. She hardly spoke to her customers at the pub and had only the most functional conversations on the reception desk. Perhaps ghosts were only the mind pushing out loneliness.
On her infrequent days off, she would walk for miles and miles, up Highgate Hill or the Great North Road underneath the Hornsey Lane Bridge – Suicide Bridge they called it – a popular spot for self-destruction. Julia would end up in Hampstead or Alexandra Palace and carry on walking to exhaustion and beyond. Only when physically drained would her body allow her to sleep. Pills terrified her. How easy it would be one night to decide that she couldn’t face the next day and be found by one of her housemates, her face contorted, a paper envelope in her hand.
As she approached her house, she saw a man waiting on the pavement outside. It wasn’t Gideon or Alan – wrong build. She felt sick. Could it be Brandon’s father? No, this man wasn’t old enough. He was mid-thirties, wore corduroy trousers and a blue parka.
Julia walked past and opened the gate, without acknowledging him. She was halfway up the path when he said, ‘Ms Winter.’
‘Yes,’ she said automatically.
‘My name’s Mike Lancaster. I’d like to ask you a few questions.’
‘Why?’
‘I’m trying to find someone. A Mr Brandon Wells. His parents haven’t heard from him in fourteen months. They’re extremely concerned and have hired me to try to find him. I thought I’d start by speaking to everyone who shared his house in Guildford. See if he’s been in touch. You lived there at the same time I believe.’
‘The police already asked me about this, back in Guildford. He stole some money.’
‘The family aren’t convinced by that version of events, especially as they’ve heard nothing from him.’
‘Then they should contact the police. I can’t help you, Mr Lancaster. Now please, I’ve been on my feet since seven this morning.’
Lancaster came through the gate and held out a card.
‘Here,’ he said. ‘My contact details, in case you do remember anything.’
Julia took the card without a word and walked to the door, pausing as she placed her key in the lock. Lancaster was still waiting, watching her. She turned to him.
‘Have you been following me?’ she asked.
‘No.’
‘You have – for the last month, at least.’
He responded with a cough that suppressed a laugh.
‘Ms Winter, I was paid to find you and ask about Brandon. The Wells’ budget doesn’t stretch to long-term surveillance. Would I find something out if it did?’
‘Goodnight, Mr Lancaster.’
Julia shut the door behind her. Through the spyhole she watched his distorted image move away under the glow of orange streetlamps. His size and gait were not that of her pursuer. Ghosts don’t exist. If Mike Lancaster hadn’t been following her, who had?
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